


like flowers and blue skies

by HannahPelham



Series: girls in red [1]
Category: Endeavour (TV)
Genre: Cottagecore, F/F, Scotland, joan thursday is a lesbian icon and i will not be taking any further questions at this time, joyce and joan are cottagecore lesbians, wlw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-19
Updated: 2020-08-19
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:27:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25992133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HannahPelham/pseuds/HannahPelham
Summary: Joan Thursday needs a break from Oxford, so she goes to stay with Morse's sister Joyce in Scotland, and it doesn't quite go the way Joan expects.title from i wanna be your girlfriend by girl in red
Relationships: Joan Thursday/Joyce Morse
Series: girls in red [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1886545
Comments: 2
Kudos: 10





	like flowers and blue skies

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Merica_grace](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merica_grace/gifts).



> For the cottagecore wlw icon in my life, Merry

Joan Thursday was sick of Oxford. She was sick of being stuck in the same place as her parents and everything she’d ever known. She wanted change, an adventure, something different. She’d had something different before and it hadn’t gone very well, but she knew change was good for her. 

Opportunities seemed few and far between - where would she go? What would she do? Would she make friends? Would she be happy?

At least three of these questions were answered one morning when Morse walked through the front door of the Thursday family home. 

“Joan wants to get away” Win mentioned, sort of in passing more than anything else.

“Like on holiday or to move away?” Morse asked. He had an idea of how to help. He liked to give back in any way he could to the Thursdays, they were more than kind to him.

“Move away - I need to get away from Oxford for a while” Joan explained, walking into the kitchen to get a cup of tea. She flashed a smile in Morse’s direction as she sat down at the small table. 

“Well, I was just thinking that Joyce has just moved to a remote little village and it seems very sweet, you could always go and stay with her or something?” 

“Where? I don’t care how far, just any kind of break would be nice” Joan replied quickly. She was worried she sounded almost too eager. 

“It’s up in the Highlands I’m afraid, a long way but I think you’d like it, she says there are mountains to climb and rivers and walks and flowers and it’s all very picturesque, it’s near a loch I think” Morse explained, mentally writing himself a note to telephone his sister and say Joan was coming to stay.

Two days later, Joan sat on a train to the Highlands with a suitcase. She watched the scenery as the train made its way through the lowlands, and up towards the station Joan knew to get off at. She had its name written on a piece of paper - Achnashellach - but she was sure she’d struggle to pronounce it if asked. 

When Joan got off the train, it wasn’t hard to tell which woman waiting on the platform was Joyce. Despite only being his half-sister, Joyce looked remarkably like Morse. Their hair was the same gingery brown, their eyes the same hue. She walked over, somewhat nervously, with her suitcase in hand. 

“Joyce?” she asked as she approached the woman. 

“You must be Joan” the woman replied, gently hugging the younger woman. They chatted away as they walked to Joyce’s car, with Joan taking in Joyce’s features, working out what exactly she recognised from Morse and what was new. 

Joan stared out the window as they drove down the side of the loch towards the village of Balnacra. Joyce looked over every now and then at the young woman as they drove through the village to a small group of cottages, almost in a semicircle. Joyce parked up and helped Joan inside with her suitcase. Joan walked into the cottage to see flowers drying from racks on the ceiling, and she could smell something freshly baked. She sat down at the kitchen table as Joyce poured her a cup of tea from the teapot, which had a homemade tea cosy on it. An AGA in the corner of the kitchen heated the room, which she imagined could get quite cold in the winter. Joyce moved around the small, cluttered kitchen in a way Joan had never seen. She was graceful, her long cream flowing dress fluttering delicately behind her as a breeze came in from the back door, bringing all the scents of the flowers in from the garden. The garden itself was full of flowers and plants as far as Joan could see, as well as multiple washing lines hung with dresses and skirts, blowing gently in the breeze. Joan didn’t think she’d ever been somewhere as beautiful, which she thought was saying something considering her previous home in Oxford. 

Joyce gestured for Joan to follow her out into the garden, and they sat on the lawn drinking their tea, and eating lemon and lavender cake. 

“My brother said you needed a break” Joyce said, as she sipped her tea. The cup and saucer didn’t match, but Joan assumed that was intentional. 

“It’s been a dramatic few years, what with Morse and Dad off being policemen and Sam going away in the army and my, well, running away that ended up going very badly indeed” Joan replied, taking a bite of cake. Joyce didn’t push that, she was sure if Joan wanted her to know, she’d tell her in time. In truth, she knew a little from what her brother had told her, but he’d told her in confidence. 

As Joyce took the tea things inside, she watched as Joan took in her surroundings, looking at the flowers and the forest behind. The breeze dropped and the sun began to shine, the bright sunlight glinting off the stream that ran through the garden, a tributary of the loch. Joyce could already see that Joan was happy here, that she was calm in what she guessed was the first time in a long time. The younger woman seemed more at peace here than she had on the train station platform only an hour or so before. 

Within days of living with Joyce, baking and cooking in the day, eating copious amounts of cake, and drinking pot after pot of tea, Joan realised that she could be very happy in the highlands. She wondered if any of the cottages in the row by Joyce’s house were up for sale, or would be any time soon. 

“I don’t think so, but you’re more than welcome to stay here for as long as you like” Joyce had replied when Joan had asked. Joan immediately assured Joyce that she wanted to stay. Her parents sent up boxes of her belongings with Morse when he came for a brief visit, but by and large it was just Joan and Joyce. 

The first thing Joan did, mostly due to lack of shops in Balnacra, was learn to use a sewing machine and make her own clothes. Joyce taught her how to cut out paper patterns and soon Joan had a few more dresses, as well as a full length apron, for all the baking and cooking she and Joyce were doing. Joyce sold what they made in the village and to neighbours, and it was enough to keep them afloat. Sometimes they’d swap cake or pie for eggs or milk or whatever they needed from the village shop. They’d dry flowers sometimes, or even do flower arrangements from Joyce’s garden for events in the village. 

It was around the time of the village fete, when they were making a huge pan of raspberry and rose jam, that Joan realised something. She thought she might be falling for Joyce. Joan had never considered herself someone susceptible to falling for someone of the same gender, but she supposed she’d never had the occasion to. 

She tried not to think about it as they made lemon curd, the citrus smell flowing through the house, mixing with the other cooking smells, making the house smell like it could be made of cake. With each thing made, or baked, or pressed, or arranged, Joan found herself falling deeper and deeper into her feelings for Joyce. 

At the village fete, Joan and Joyce sat with their table stacked with jars and bottles, watching the world go by. Small children ran up with coins given to them by their parents, to buy something the ‘flower women’, as they were sometimes referred to, had made. Flowers were pinned to shirts and jackets as button holes, or Joan would weave them into little girls’ hair. It was the best day Joan had had in years, and she was glad she could share it with Joyce. 

Tearing herself away from Joyce to go back down to Oxford for a week was harder than Joan thought it ought to have been. The train made its way away from Achnashellach, and as it did Joan wished she could jump off and head back to Joyce. 

She was surprised to see Morse waiting for her at the train station when she arrived back in Oxford. 

“Thought I’d catch you before your parents did, see how Joyce is” He explained as Joan got into his car. 

“She’s good, she’s so lovely, Morse” Joan replied, smiling. Morse raised his eyebrows. 

“And how are you, Miss Thursday?”

“I...I’m ok, I’m happy up in Scotland with Joyce, but I’m a tad confused about things” she replied, trying not to meet Morse’s gaze.

“Oh?”

“Promise you won’t tell Mum, Dad, or Sam?”

“I promise” Morse replied.

“I think I was going for the wrong Morse sibling” Joan admitted. Morse looked entirely unsurprised.

“Joyce would be lucky to have you” he said, somewhat sad Joan had fallen for his sister instead of missing him more, but happy for her all the same. He knew the way Joyce swung, so to speak. Joyce had come out to him on the day homosexuality became legal in the UK a year or so before, though lesbianism had never been illegal. He never knew Joan swung that way too, he didn’t think she’d known herself until now, but he was happy for her for discovering herself, even if it meant discovering herself with his sister. 

Joan never mentioned a word of this to her parents, lest she look like an idiot if nothing happened with Joyce. If nothing happened, her parents would never know about this, but she wasn’t worried about that. She was worried about what they’d say if something did happen between herself and Miss Morse, rather than Mr Morse. 

Upon her return to Scotland, Joan found herself completely in love with Joyce. She wrapped her arms around the woman tightly as they met on the train station platform. As they reached the cottage again, Joan wondered how on earth she was going to cope if she didn’t try and see if Joyce was interested in her. She had to know, either way. 

That night, Joan offered to make dinner. Joyce gratefully accepted and set about making them a drink from their homemade sloe gin. They sat at the small table in the kitchen, an oil lamp hanging above them for light as the sun began to set. They ate their dinner and chatted about Joan’s trip to Oxford, about Morse, as well as the Thursdays. 

Joan cleared the table and started washing up, sipping her gin, as she felt Joyce come up behind her. Gentle hands were placed on her shoulders, and she turned around. Joan’s breath hitched in her throat as she saw Joyce glance down at her lips. Joan took the plunge, and leant forward. Her lips connected with Joyce’s in a gentle, quick kiss, but Joan found Joyce’s lips back on hers before she could pull away properly. Joan dried her hands on her apron, and moved them so they were holding onto Joyce’s waist. The older woman had her arms around Joan’s shoulders, pulling her closer. They stood there in the breeze from the garden, the light from the oil lamp, for an amount of time neither of them could put a finger on. 

When Joan woke up the next morning, under the quilt of Joyce’s bed rather than her own, with the older woman’s arms around her waist, Joan realised she was the happiest she was ever going to be, here, with Joyce, forever. 

  
  



End file.
